One Hundred and Sixty Seven

I don't know what I'm supposed to do.

I don't know what's right
what's best
what fits.

I don't like not knowing what's right.


This should be simpler than it is.

One Hundred and Sixty Six

Apparently you still dream of me.
I don't doubt that.
I don't doubt you wonder if I wonder about you. I don't doubt you play over that conversation in your head, and think of everything you should've said, and didn't. I don't doubt you regret all those messages after. I don't doubt you hope to run into me sometimes, when you walk by that street, and see that snow.
Sometimes I hope I run into you.
I don't know what I'd say.
I don't miss you.
I thought I did. Some piece of you, however small, some significant morsel of genuine happiness I can take from whatever it was we had. But I don't.
And I don't know if I'm sorry that you do.
I'm happy
without you.

I have always been happy
without you.

One Hundred and Sixty Five

I can feel it.

Beneath my toes, I can feel the rumbling
and a lightness in my head.

I can feel it.
It's like a train, about to arrive.

Like I'm at a train platform, empty, but warm.
There aren't any timetables or clocks
I just know it's coming right on time.

I didn't think it'd be like a train.
I thought it'd be more like the brink of a cliff, like a diving board.
A waterfall.
A pirate ship plank.

I never once thought I wouldn't be the one moving.
I'm not.

It's coming towards me.
It's like a train.

One Hundred and Sixty Four

I can't quite explain it.
Cos it feels like a balloon too, in its own way.
Inflating, inside
and I didn't know I had room for this.

And it feels like skydiving.
Skydiving with the wind hitting so fast and it's not like I haven't had the taste of oxygen,
never had my windpipes so open,
but never like this.

And still it feels like snorkeling, too.
Like warmth, and ease, and a safe, safe lull.
Blue water
deep dark blue
the same deep, patient blue your room faded into
the night I forwent sleep
and


it feels like slipping on a coat
just the right fit.
I didn't know I could find one
that fit so well.
so warm. and
comfortable.
Like a coat I'd passed by so many times, searching for just its fit,
just these size pockets, just this cut and hem, and never once did I notice it
until it just fell from its hangar onto my shoulders
sliding into my hands.

And it feels like none of these things, really.
I can't explain it.

One Hundred and Sixty Three

I feel like
you make me be
the best person I can be.

Like I'm just the best, most caring, most open, most giving person I can be.
Like I'm realizing my full potential.
Like I could have always been this person,
but now I am.

And yet I'm still me. I'm not trying. I'm not changing. I just am.
You make me be
the best version of myself.

One Hundred and Sixty Two

Are you awake?
There's just something real fast I want to say to you.

Don't look so worried.
Why are you?
This is nothing but good.

And you don't have to understand it.
I understand if you don't.
(I can understand for both of us
i can be patient
for all of us.)

just please don't fight it
and please just try real hard to listen.

I want to share this with you
because you deserve to share this with me.
You deserve to have the opportunity
to be closer to me
to be happy for me.

Please take it.
Please please take it.

One Hundred and Sixty One

A letter I won't send
that you wouldn't have read anyway.

There are two things I genuinely want for you.

The first
to be incandescently happy.
I do, I want you to be loved. I want you to be put first. I want you to be cared for, and cherished. I want you to be reassured and listened to, and protected. I want you to be safe. I do.
And kids. I want you to be healthy enough to get pregnant, and have all five of those kids. I want you to have that blue picket fence, those white windowsills. I want you to have that womens' sewing circle on Sunday. And I want you to live a long, happy, healthy life.

And secondly
to have this life
far
far away from me.
I want you to reach a point in your life where you can be mature enough to be civil but never have a need for me in your life, never want me back, never want me to call, never imagine yourself in my arms. Never pine, never want, never need what you're never going to have again.

One Hundred and Sixty Six

Things I don't have words for:

- Unbearable pain
- Unstoppable anger
- The first time you grip me
as hard as I always do.

One Hundred and Sixty Five

What if I don't get in?
You will.
But what if I don't?
You will.
Yes. Yes, I realize everyone is saying that, alright? I realize they're saying that because that's what I would say. But what. if I don't? What if I actually don't? What if they all reject me? All of them?
Well. You move on.
..I move on?
Yeah.
To what? To where? Where will I go?
Anywhere.
..anywhere?
Yes.
How?
You just will.
I can't do that.
Yes you can. There's more to life than school. You know this. I know you do. Somewhere deep down you still know this. You have always been more than just a mark, an evaluation. This won't be the end of you.
You're wrong. You're so wrong. But you're being kind. Maybe that's what I need.

One Hundred and Sixty Four

I just thought of it the other day: Trust.

Trust isn't built with time.
You're wrong.

I should've told you that, back when we were still on speaking terms. (Remember when we were still on speaking terms?) Maybe I'll just write you a letter.
I mean you never read them, but..

Anyway. You're wrong.
She doesn't have to trust you.
She doesn't have to.

She shouldn't have to 'just cos' you've known one another for so long, or 'just cos' you've never done anything to break that trust. You don't trust someone just cos they haven't given you reason not to. You trust someone after you get to know them, and see them, and let them see you, and you trust someone who should be trusted, cos they're the kind of person who is inherently trustworthy.
You don't deserve to be trusted.

You have no sense of privacy
only a need to flash about to attract as many eyes as possible, as much murmuring as your silly head can hold in at a time.
You have no sense of respect
only a giddy reaction to absolutely everything and a twisted skill to morph it into something about you, then blabbing lips to tell everyone it does not concern.
And you have no sense of patience
only a temperate attitude to getting through things the quick route around, casting aside poingancy and causal honesty, a cold and annoyed grimace.

Love you?
How could anyone
let alone me
love you
when they can't trust you as far as they can throw you